Opencart users?

[DavidSP]

Hey there, is there any opencart users in this forum. My friend is planning to change his website from shopify to opencart. What are the pros and cons?

 

[arnydnxluk]

Hey, UKBF is home to many OpenCart users and developers, plus there's a dedicated OpenCart forum but it's a bit quiet there.

OpenCart comes with greater complexities over something like Shopify but in return you have much better control over your store, so it's normally worth the upgrade at a certain point. Why is your friend looking to make the switch?

 

[antropy]

Shopify Main Pros

• No setup fees
• Most themes look really good
• Can make custom themes
• Quick and easy to get a shop online
• Good chat support
• Good uptime and high load handling

Shopify Main Cons

• No ability to change store functionality so many changes just aren't possible
• Monthly fees usually higher than self-hosted monthly fees
• Most extensions have monthly fees
• Vendor lock in

OpenCart Main Pros

• Platform is free and fairly mature (meaning stable, secure and reliable)
• Large marketplace of cheap and good extensions to do almost anything
• Lots of nice themes (some free) although possibly not as nice as Shopify themes
• Developers have full control to add any feature and integrate with any other system
• Codebase is simple which keeps your development and server costs low
• You can host anywhere you want
• Active community forums usually assist within hours

OpenCart Main Cons

• Initial cost of setup if you go for custom features and a custom theme is high
• Some extensions and themes are poor quality so you must choose wisely
• You're responsible for your own hosting and bug fixing so you should have your own freelancer or agency on-hand and a good hosting company (although there is now OpenCart Cloud which overcomes this)
• No official online chat support